Vintage
Vintage at Brokenwood is the most vibrant and exhausting time of year. The team of regular staff is bolstered by a constantly evolving team of itinerant wine industry workers as part of our vintage exchange programme, which takes in young winemakers from Italy, New Zealand, as well as Australia.
Binding all of this together is the vintage chef, who makes breakfast, lunch and dinner for all the crew, and anyone who happens to be in cellar door at the right time.
Vintage commences as early as January, when the Hunter Valley fruit is picked. Semillon is the first variety to come in. Vintage lasts until April, when the last of the fruit from the cooler climate regions is picked.
2007
The global warming discussion continues unabated. Whether a recent phenomena or part of the earth’s cyclical climate change, ‘things ain’t what they used to be’, or are they?
The rainfall records for the Lower Hunter Valley shows an average rainfall of 800mm calculated between 1919 and 2006. However since 1992, our last year above 800mm there has not been one year at that average - 14 years all up. On closer examination a similar period occurred between 1932 and 1948 – 17years.
As a wise farmer once said, ‘the last drought was broken by rain!’ and so for the moment we wait. The year 2006 was one of the driest on record with a miserly 416mm. A dry 2006 vintage and continuing dry until rain (133mm) in September. Brokenwood as usual commenced irrigation well before budburst. A further 30mm in early November kept the vines going as water restrictions on the PID (the Hunter private water pipeline) became a reality.
Cooler weather over Xmas gave some respite but short lived. High temperatures and low ground water meant an early start to picking with Brokenwood kicking off on the 17th January, a week later than others in the Valley. Not completely abnormal with 2000, 2001 and 2003 of the recent vintages also around that time.
High temperatures across the continent brought on devastating bushfires, most notably North-East Victoria where it was a case of weeks not days. The Hunter, surprisingly and thankfully was fire free. The issue of smoke taint in some of the 07 wines will no doubt be discussed at length.
Quality of the Hunter Valley Semillons is excellent. In style terms probably the most diverse we have seen for some time. Reports of sauvignon blanc characters (Semillon does share the pyrazine component of sauvignon blanc and cabernet) right through to talc and lanolin. Alcohols will also be quite varied. Brokenwood picked from 18 separate vineyards for our largest ever Semillon intake.
The Graveyard Vineyard Shiraz was picked in two halves with a small amount in before 50mm of rain on the 12/13 February. Being so dry no problems and in fact probably gave the vines a bit of a lift and an extra week of hang-time to get the tannins riper. Excellent colour and sugar varying between 13.5 and 14.5 baume.
Of the other areas, Cowra down significantly due to drought, Beechworth down significantly due to frost and drought. McLaren Vale will be slightly down with quality high.
2008
Preliminary report 11th January 2008
The very small crop for the 2007 vintage had its genesis in the dry 2006 year, where only 416mm of rain fell. About half the 87 year average of 800mm. January 2007 was dry as was July and October. To then end up with over 1000mm of rain for the year, only the 8th time since 1919, meant some very wet months in between. La Nina was well and truly back. The last year over 1000mm was 1990.
The most significant was the June long weekend floods. While the vineyards benefited, the farming land from Maitland down to Newcastle did suffer. Newcastle itself flooded badly with an estimated 5500 cars written off. That month saw 333mm of rain at Brokenwood, 246mm over the long week end.
So the vines were set for a very good start and bud burst was slightly ahead of schedule. Good ground water and a very hot October saw very good growth. November rain amounted to 190mm and then a further 150 in December and while there was plenty of cloud cover the sub tropical heat was still present.
Pressure on vineyard management saw a helicopter in the area for a few vineyards including Brokenwood. An out break of Fruit Fly in some vineyards proved a new problem. The best solution for this was to green harvest the affected fruit and destroy it. As a result there were some happy porkers at nearby piggeries.
Update 21st February
January finished with 108mm of rain and considerable disease pressure meant all white grapes were harvested by the end of the month. Brokenwood finished up crushing approx 270t of Hunter Valley semillon. A ‘back to the future’ vintage with final alcohols between 9.5 and 10.5%. Very reminiscent of the 1970s. The difference being that now days Hunter winemakers capture the lifted grassy characters of semillon. They will be appealing both as young wines and have the structure to age for many years.
The first 10 days of February saw 170mm of rain that has delayed ripening of the red grapes. Brokenwood launched an attack on the weekend of 16th and 17th picking some of the young vine blocks. Sugars were low, so 20% juice run off and some neutral concentrate boost needed.
All old vine blocks are holding with the forecast showing a small window until major rain expected in the first week of March. The ‘cellar rats’ have been treated to the odd wet year Hunter red being opened for them. A 1984 Graveyard Shiraz from magnum, at 12% alcohol drank superbly.
Picking is underway in Cowra, McLaren Vale and Beechworth.
Iain Riggs
Managing Director/Chief Winemaker
